


Encircle Me

by goldheartedsky



Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Angst and Tragedy, Canon Divergence - Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Captain America: The Winter Soldier, Character Death, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-21
Updated: 2018-07-21
Packaged: 2019-06-13 21:11:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 907
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15373413
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goldheartedsky/pseuds/goldheartedsky
Summary: Steve doesn’t know how he ends up with the knife. He doesn’t know how his shield escaped him and how he ended up in the back of a truck, slipping in the blood on the floor. He doesn’t know how to fix any of it, his heart racing in his throat.





	Encircle Me

**Author's Note:**

> Warning: MAJOR character death. Bloody stuff but not extremely graphic.
> 
> Title from “The Con” by Tegan and Sara.

 

Steve doesn’t know how he ends up with the knife. He doesn’t know how his shield escaped him and how he ended up in the back of a truck, slipping in the blood on the floor. He doesn’t know how to fix any of it, his heart racing in his throat.

 

*

 

In his head, he plays a supercut of the two of them.

 

The laugh that used to make his head spin. Used to make him lose his breath, and not just from his asthma.

 

The two of them shivering in the back of a freezer truck, that almost snake like grin sparkling across the foot between them.

 

The first time they kissed.

 

Bodies pressed on the mattress in his room, hands fumbling between bodies staining the sheets with sweat.

 

The last time they kissed.

 

*

 

“Promise me we’ll always be friends?”

 

Steel blue eyes looking down at him, that snake like smile slithering its way across his face.

 

“I love you, Steve.”

 

*

 

He hits the bus at nearly fifteen miles an hour and it hurts. He pushes himself up, glass digging into his hands. His shield isn’t there but there are bullets. Civilians. God, his head.

 

Sam.

 

Natasha.

 

He bursts through the back window as the bus goes up in flames.

 

His shield. Where was his shield?

 

More bullets more bullets more bullets but there go the men, dropping to the ground. No, not men, just Hydra. He kicks one off the roof of a car, but Sam says, “You go, I got this!”

 

“I got this!”

 

*

 

“Get out of the way!”

 

*

 

Steve had been sick.

 

That’s how he remembers it, at least.

 

Bucky running through the streets, his soft boots thudding against the brick. Steve, his arms, his legs, his body dangling from his arms, gasping for air. His throat felt he had a noose around it, pulling him back from where they were running from. Where Bucky was running from.

 

Steve had been sick.

 

“Mrs. Rogers! Mrs. Rogers!”

 

Bucky’s terrified voice stumbling up the three flights of stairs. Bucky’s terrified legs calling up to his mother.

 

Steve had been sick.

 

*

 

“Help! Somebody help!”

 

Steve’s terrified voice stumbling across the road. Steve’s terrified legs calling for salvation.

 

*

 

He doesn’t know how he gets the knife.

 

He knows his shield short circuits the Winter Soldier’s metal arm. That must be when he drops the knife. Must be must be. That’s when Steve grabs the knife as it falls. Must be.

 

There’s a sickening crunch of his shield on bone as he swings it up, catching the Winter Soldierunder the jaw. The man grabs for the knife again and Steve reaches back behind him, swinging him over his shoulder. That’s how the knife ends up in the soldier’s throat. Must be.

 

*

 

His heart ached when he heard “The 107th,” fall out of Bucky’s mouth.

 

Bucky.

 

His father.

 

Himself.

 

Casualties of war.

 

*

 

He stares at the blood as it drops across the highway.

 

The knife ends up, buried to its handle, in the Winter Soldier’s neck, staining the ground crimson.

 

He doesn’t even know how he got the damn knife.

 

The soldier is knees down on the ground, an elbow down, his body down, on the pavement, metal hand grabbing at his neck, grabbing at his chest, grabbing for his gun. The knife clatters to the ground, ringing like a wind chime in the middle of the city.

 

He stumbles, drops, collapses, to the pavement, grabbing at his neck.

 

Steve turns him over and rips the mask off.

 

*

 

His mam cries when she finds out.

 

When she finds them, sixteen, seventeen, kissing each other carefully on the fire escape.

 

His mam dies two years later.

 

And there they are, there he is, eighteen, nineteen, on their own.

 

*

 

“The thing is, you don’t have to.”

 

A hand on his shoulder, his hand on his shoulder.

 

*

 

“Bucky.”

 

The pool of blood grows, staining his hands, his jacket, the leather, the road.

 

The steel blue eyes that used to crinkle at the corners now beg him for an escape. The lips he used to press his against bubble up with blood, gurgling as the Winter Soldier, as Bucky grapples at the wound, grapples at Steve.

 

“Help! Somebody help!”

 

*

 

Bucky was dying.

 

That’s how he remembers it at least.

 

Bucky’s body is limp, compliant, as a truck pulls up.

 

Sam.

 

Natasha.

 

Maria.

 

His terrified voice stumbling across the road. His terrified legs calling for salvation.

 

Bucky’s body drops with a crack, with a thud, onto the floor of the truck. The blood pools, reflecting off the metal, Steve’s knees slipping as he tries to close the wound. Bucky gasps weakly, thickly, wetly as he struggles on the floor.

 

“What do I do? What do I do!?”

 

Bucky’s blood.

 

Natasha’s blood.

 

*

 

“Steve, you have to let go.”

 

His father.

 

His mam.

 

His love.

 

His life.

 

“Steve, come on, you need to-”

 

The blood cracks on his knuckles, on his jacket, on his jeans. It’s turned thick like syrup, like molasses dripping from the open doors of the truck. He doesn’t know where they are. He won’t leave, he can’t leave.

 

His father.

 

His mam.

 

His love.

 

His life.

 

*

 

“Steve, it’s not your fault.”

 

Peggy had said that to him.

 

Maria had said that to him.

 

“You know that’s not true.”

 

*

 

“Bucky.”

 

The steel blue eyes. The snake like smile.

 

“I love you, Bucky.”

 

*

 

Steve doesn’t know how he ends up with the knife.

 


End file.
